MANCHESTER CITY and Liverpool collide in the Capital One Cup final on Sunday for the first silverware of the season.

Tueart and Kennedy have both won the League Cup with Manchester City and Liverpool respectively

Dennis Tueart and Alan Kennedy both tasted success in the competition with blue and red respectively. Here they looked back and to the future.

Dennis, it will be 40 years to the day on Sunday since your famous overhead kick sealed a League Cup final win for City. What do you remember?

DT: Believe it or not but the final wasn't live on TV. It was played on a Saturday and then the highlights were on Brian Moore's show the next day. We scored first through Peter Barnes from a set-piece routine we'd planned in training to take their big guys away, but Alan Gowling equalised for Newcastle. My goal came a minute after half-time and lots of people tell me they missed it!

Willie Donachie played a cross into the area, Tommy Booth won a header and I had gone in too far and the ball was behind me. But you know where the goal is and you just do what you have to do. I don't know about overhead kicks being my so-called speciality but City supporters tell me I scored a better one a week or two before the final against Sheffield United. I cannot even remember it.

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AK: When I saw him do the overhead kick I thought no one is going to get that high and execute it. We had a very, very good goalkeeper in Mick Mahoney so to beat him from 10 yards was something else. It was a great strike. What can you do?

DT: I wanted to show my respect for Newcastle as a club so, after the final whistle, I exchanged shirts with Alan and went up to collect my medal - they were tankards in those days - wearing a Newcastle shirt.

I was almost refused it! Some dignitary put his hand on my shoulder and said 'not yet son, you're a bit premature!' mistaking me for a Newcastle player. Someone had to point out that I was actually the City player who had scored the winning goal!

AK: I remember Frank Clark saying to me after the FA Cup final in 1974: 'Don't worry son, there will be plenty more finals in the future'. He thought it was his last ever final but he went on to win the European Cup with Nottingham Forest in 1979 at the age of 35.

He was right...

AK: When I went to Liverpool we had tremendous success in the competition along with everything else. I scored in two League Cup finals. The first was in the 1981 final against West Ham. I scored what I thought was going to be the winner a couple of minutes before the end of extra-time but West Ham equalised in the 120th minute when Ray Stewart smashed home a penalty.

In the replay at Villa Park, I was at fault for West Ham's goal. I was out of position, something that happened a few times in my career (!), but we won it with goals from Dalglish and Hansen.

I also scored against Manchester United in the 1983 final. I remember I was up against Steve Coppell. I was giving him problems by going forward. He allowed me to have a shot and the ball flew just over Gary Bailey's bar, so I was getting my range. Then when I got my opportunity I took it on, got the chance to shoot and it skidded off the surface and beat Bailey. I think Bailey sees Ian Rush closing in and thinks if he palms it out Rushie would put it in. So it comes off his hands and goes in the back of the net. I won four League Cups in total.

DT: Years later I found out when I was at a football dinner in London and I shared a cab with the former Liverpool chairman Sir John Smith and he told me, 'you don't know how close you were to joining us!'

Bill Shankly had tried to buy me before the transfer deadline [in March 1974] but Sunderland had said 'no, we're not selling'.

Is Sunday's final more important to Jurgen Klopp or Manuel Pellegrini?

AK: If Klopp wins a trophy he can hold that up at the end of the season and say this is the start of something. He gets more time and patience from everyone to impose his strategy and more transfer money. What I am surprised about at the moment is Benteke not getting a look in. I'm wondering why. He's fit and he's ready to go and I would play him against City.

DT: It's a week that can define City's season. They've had a good result against Kiev, now the final and then it's Liverpool again in the league a few days after Wembley which is vital for their hopes of the title and finishing in the top four.

Pellegrini knows he's going so he has got the incentive of going out and saying, 'here's a trophy, thanks for the memories'. He was told to win five in five years - well if he wins it on Sunday that would be three in three seasons. That's not bad? The players will want to win it for him. And remember when he goes for his next job he will want another trophy on his CV.